WORKSHOP: Greenlight Presentation (Feedback and Reflections)

Green Light

Today we had the 'Greenlight' Presentations to communicate our ideas for the Pre-Production unit to Simon, Andrea and the rest of the group. The purpose of this process was to gain some feedback on our progress and what we have done so far in regards to these ideas. It was also an opportunity to resolve any issues or struggles we had encountered so far to build on the projects further. Although, I feel confident in my idea and know what I need to be doing next, I think that this process will be beneficial in developing the aspects of my package.

Story Structure and Characters 
For my presentation, I wanted to include the characters and story that I have worked on so far, as I haven't tackled the graphics much. I had worked on my story structure, breaking it up into the 6 episodes that would make up the television series. When writing the outlines, I tried to end each episode with an exciting event or a cliff hanger type ending. I chose to do this because when watching television dramas myself, I will want to continue watching if some of the story is still left untold, making me want to continue watching. For the presentation, I listed these outlines with clear but broad titles that would insinuate where about in the story each episode would lie.
In terms of my character development, I feel like I know my characters relatively well at this point but wasn't able to go into too much detail for the purpose of the presentation. Therefore, I just completed a few slides that gave some bullet points about who the characters in the series would be and what their input to the story would be.
Simon flagged up that I had largely based the character of Vivian on Joyce from 'Stranger Things'. Although, this is good practice for detailed character development, his feedback was that I shouldn't make the character too similar because the series is largely about her. Therefore, the audience who have also seen 'Stranger Things' might associate this series too much and won't see it as something original and interesting in its own right. To amend this, I will be making sure the actress I choose differs from Winona Ryder who played Joyce in 'Stranger Things', whilst still being a confident acting choice for this character.
In terms of casting, I have researched some potential ideas and thought about why they would all be suitable. The feedback I received from Simon and Andrea for the casting choices was generally positive, however, Simon reiterated that I should make sure I'm looking at all of their previous work to assess whether their acting styles would be suitable for the cast.

Broadcasting Channel and Graphics
For this production, I have chosen 'Netflix' as the Broadcasting Channel and Platform. The reasons I had for this were because I think that the genre and story itself lend themselves to the material that is usually found on Netflix. As I had obtained some inspiration from another Netflix Original Production and based some of the themes and characters on it, I feel like this would be the best platform to appeal to my intended audience. A question was raised about whether choosing Netflix would be the most suitable choice as it could be too similar to other series already on there. This is something I am going to do more research on and try and justify my reasoning further as I think that Netflix is the right choice and it would lend itself well to this specific platform.
In terms of the visuals I have worked on up to this point, I have made the least amount of progress in comparison to the story and character development. However, I feel like this was the right order to work in as I think that you need to establish your story first and know it really well to devise the right look for it.
As a starting point though, I decided on the colour scheme and palette which would be used throughout the branding and be used for the final book. After looking at what other series with similar themes use, I decided to go for something mono tone with no colour accents. Although this is an early decision, I think that I am likely to stick to this. For the purpose of testing out the colour scheme, I have experimented with font and the title on the photoshop, adding in a cracked image to create some very first graphic impressions. This was to allow me to assess whether the mono tone colour scheme would work and look effective, of which I think it does. Although these are first drafts, I am pleased with the the arrangement of the text and plan to use these as starting points to develop the graphics. I was given some good feedback on these titles in the presentation, which filled me with confidence that I had made some good early decisions for the visuals.

Pitch/Presentation Screenshot

Pitch/Presentation Screenshot